Evangeline’s pride was in tatters, but the argument had to end somewhere, so she held her tongue. Scully opened the door and waited for her to precede him inside, and she stepped over the threshold without looking at him.

Abigail was standing in the middle of the bed she’d shared with Evangeline, looking nervous as a spinster driven to high ground by a mouse, and her eyes were enormous. She was porcelain-pale, and her teeth were sunk deep into her lower lip.

“It’s all right, Abigail,” Scully said quietly, latching the door and putting the gun back in its place over the lintel. He’d correctly guessed that she’d been peering out the window above the bed, that was obvious from the state she was in. “The wolves are gone.”

“They’ll come back,” Abigail said.

Evangeline went to her child, held out both arms. She’d forgotten she was still wearing Scully’s coat until then. “Darling,” she said. “Come here.”

Tears welled in Abigail’s blue eyes and her lower lip, red from being raked by her teeth, wobbled. “You went out there, Mama. You went outside, where the wolves were. What if they’d eaten you and Scully both, like Little Red Ridinghood and her grandmother? I’d have been all alone. Forever and ever.”

“No, sweetheart,” Evangeline said, but she didn’t dare look at Scully because she knew what she’d see in his eyes. She had taken a foolish risk, and yet she couldn’t say she was truly sorry, because she still believed that if she hadn’t called out to Scully, he would have been killed or badly injured by the black wolf. “I won’t leave you. I promise.”

“You could die, like Papa did,” Abigail insisted. She was still keeping her distance, but it was clear that she was wavering a little.

Evangeline didn’t answer; she just stood there, in Scully’s big coat, with her arms extended, and finally Abigail flung herself into her mother’s embrace. Holding the child tightly, Evangeline turned and found herself facing Scully. Their gazes locked for a long, charged moment.

“I’d better go out and see what I can do to settle down the stock,” he said, after an interval had passed.

Evangeline set Abigail on her feet and took off the coat. “You’ll need this,” she said.

“What if the wolves come back?” Abigail asked, staring at Scully.

“I’ll run them off again,” Scully answered. He didn’t sound glib, just sure of himself, a man who had grown used to such challenges by meeting similar ones over and over. He crossed the room, caught one of Abigail’s dark ringlets between two fingers, and gave her hair a mischievous tug. “Why don’t you have some breakfast—I made it myself—and maybe later I’ll show you that little filly I told you about. She’s out in the barn, right now, waiting for me to give her a bucket of oats.”

Abigail was won over, as easily as that. Her eyes brightened, her cheeks turned rosy again, and the smile on her upturned face was dazzling. Evangeline was jealous of that smile, for it was directed at Scully, not at her.